Gods Amongst Men
by Ardikus
Summary: Professor Ozpin is looking for new allies in his battle against the Queen. On a whim, he performs a ritual that had been detailed to him by his predecessor, knowing he had nothing to lose. What he received in return was more than he could have ever imagined.
1. Chapter 1

**AN: Well, I was going to try and finish a short story for around now to publish, but it's still in the works, so I guess I'll just throw this out instead. You know, for kicks.**

Ozpin sighed, pressing his fingers in front of him as he sat at the desk in his office.

Things were seeming bleaker by the day. With every little bit of information they gained on the Queen and her movements, their enemies seemed more and more dangerous.

Yes, not all hope was lost, there were many promising young hunters in training, but that was the issue. They were in training. None of them were ready for this fight, not truly. This would be a fight that they would have to undertake with what little strength they had. Their small brotherhood against an enemy they still didn't even know the name of, let alone the goals.

However, Ozpin was old, older than anyone knew. Old enough that he remembered hearing about ancient accords from his predecessor, a promise made that was meant to guarantee aid to the peoples of Remnant in their time of need. It was little more than a fairy tail, and one kept secret at that.

But Remnant was full of fairy tails that were true. Ozpin could only hope that this one was no different.

Standing, he moved to the elevator and stepped inside, entering a code into the console that he alone knew. He felt a slight lurch as the elevator went into action, descending to a level even deeper underground than the vault.

The doors opened and Ozpin stepped out, the tapping of his cane echoing through the large chambers as he walked towards the small pool of liquid at the end.

Sitting on a small pedestal in front of the pool was an old leather bound book. Ozpin pulled it open and flipped to the needed page, seeing the instructions. All he needed do was say the words. It was very simple, but his predecessor had stressed the weight behind the oath, if he were to ever make it. That there was no reneging on your word in this matter.

He took a deep breath before beginning.

"I stand before you to ask assistance, my world needs help, and thousands of years ago my people were given a promise of aid. I am calling upon that oath." He paused for a moment, "I ask for the aid of your heroes in protecting Remnant, and will not ask of them anything that does not journey towards this goal. They will not be abused for my own purposes, and I will aid them in any ways I can, as they will aid me. This," he took another breath, "This I swear on the River Styx."

Ozpin stood in silence, waiting for a sign. The sound of thunder erupted through the room after a long moment, startling him. In front of him, the pool of liquid began to move, swishing around. Before long it had risen from the pool and formed itself into a large swirling circle in the air, and Ozpin recognized it for what it was.

A portal. He had been answered.

* * *

"This is going to suck" Percy muttered as they walked the steps of Olympus towards the throne room. He heard Thalia snort behind him.

"Who knows, maybe they just want to say hi" she remarked, laughing. He saw Annabeth rolling her eyes out of the corner of his vision. Nico said nothing as he trudged behind them, hands in his pockets.

They'd been enjoying a day together in New York with a bunch of the others, since Thalia had been given a short leave for vacation by Artemis. They'd gone to her favourite burger place and eaten, and Hermes had shown up to summon them to Olympus, saying he'd been in the neighborhood.

When they'd all given him weird looks at that, he hiked a thumb across the street, so they'd notice the post office there.

As the doors to the throne room opened for them, Percy glanced around to get a look at all the Olympians. None of them seemed angry, or tense. Zeus looked serious as always, and when he looked at Poseidon, his dad gave him a small smile and nod for reassurance.

They stopped in the center of the room and bowed in Zeus's direction.

"Demigods," he began, sounding calm, at least by thunder god standards. "I have been advised," he paused and shot a small glare towards Poseidon, who shrugged shamelessly, "to begin by informing you that the Quest we wish to speak with you about, is not something that you must undertake." Percy's eyebrows shot up in surprise, as did his friends. Zeus noticed, huffing in annoyance.

"It isn't a difficult quest so much as a strange one, many Demigods would be able to handle it, but we're going to you four first, as it was decided you'd be the best team for it."

Thalia decided to speak up, "So whats the Quest then?"

"Long ago we made a pact with humans from another world." He paused, expecting some sort of grand shocked reaction. "What, nothing?"

"What were you expecting, we've found out over like the past 3 years that pretty much every mythology is totally true on this world, the idea of another world with intelligent life is not really a stretch." Annabeth said, shrugging.

Really though, Percy had stopped being surprised by anything the Gods told them a long while ago, it was just wasted effort.

"Well, " Zeus continued, obviously put off by our lack of reaction, "We promised that in their hour of need, should they call on us, we would provide heroes to aid them in protecting their world from evil. That call has been cast out, and we intend to honour our oath."

"This world is different from our own in some ways, " Athena had cut in now, "Should you accept, you will be blessed with sufficient knowledge of how their world works to pass yourselves off as natives, you will arrive through a portal wherever the call has been cast out. The call was sent to us days ago, but when you travel there, you will arrive only a few moments after the caller, a man named Ozpin, has sent it out."

"We don't know how much knowledge of us has survived to this point, so the extent of this Ozpin's knowledge may be somewhat limited, we can't be sure. You will need to get him to unlock your auras, however." Zeus informed them.

"Auras?" Nico asked, curious. Athena was the one to respond, naturally.

"Aura is a manifestation of your souls, it does not exist in the way it does to them in our world. You will have knowledge of it once you've gone through the portal, as well as knowledge of semblances, a special ability that is developed when your Aura is unlocked. I will make this clear, you will not have a Semblance, your Demigod powers override your ability to manifest one. When you return to this world, your aura will no longer function."

Percy glanced at the others. He saw the same expression on their faces he imagined was on his.

It really sucked not being able to say no to people who needed help. They'd been having such a good day, too.

"When do we start?" he grumbled, earning an amused look from his father.

Zeus's lips almost twitched upwards. Percy took it as a good thing. "We can summon the portal to take you there immediately, clothing will be sent with you, as well as the equivalent to a cell phone in their world, the monsters there are not drawn to demigods in specific, so using the technology there will not be dangerous."

"Oh, and the fighters in this world usually have awesome looking combat outfits to fit their personalities, and fighting styles, so we've put a little something together, when you guys get there you'll be all decked out!" Apollo exclaimed, grinning.

His twin, Artemis, rolled her eyes, "What my brother means to say, is you will have appropriate combat uniforms, We chose to leave Thalia and Nico be, as their outfits are expressive and comfortable to them, but for you two," she looked at Percy and Annabeth, "The camp shirts would not do, so you'll have variants of armour and styling, chosen by your parents to represent you and your heritage."

Well, that was certainly much better than letting Apollo decide, at least.

"Now," Zeus boomed, waving his hand to summon a large dark portal in front of them. "Step through, and you will begin your quest." He said, "Good luck."

* * *

Ozpin watched as four figures stepped through the portal, one by one.

The first was a tall boy wearing leather body armour with connected shoulder pads, underneath he had a sea green tee shirt and faded blue jeans, and black sneakers. He had a cloak attached to his armour that matched his shirt in colour, and wasn't carrying a visible weapon.

The second was a girl, a few inches shorter than the boy and wearing a metallic copy of the boy's armour which was a silvery grey. She had a pair of jean shorts with a belt which had a knife and sword hanging from it. She had no cloak like the boy, and wore a simple white shirt under her armour.

The third was another girl, who had on a much different attire than the previous two. This girl was shorter, with a black shirt with some sort of design on it, and a black leather jacket over it. This was matched with black skinny jeans and combat boots. Her weapon seemed to be a silver bow, though it didn't seem like she was carrying any arrows. The bow was slung over her back, and it matched the circlet resting on her head in colour.

The fourth and final person to walk through the portal was a boy, just slightly taller than the third girl. He wore black jeans and a black shirt, with an aviators' jacket over top. His sneakers were like those of the first boy, and a black sword hung at his side.

The four stopped and looked around the large chamber they were in, before turning to face him. Ozpin regarded them, slightly apprehensive. He'd sent a call for the aid of this other world's heroes, and though he had learned that looks could oftentimes be deceiving, it was hard to look past the fact that these four couldn't have been much older than twenty, if that. If these were the heroes had sent him, then he desperately hoped they were stronger than huntsmen and huntresses of their age group, otherwise they may not be very useful. He'd done this to try to avoid sending children into the front lines of war.

The taller, blonde girl spoke first, looking over him with curious eyes. "You must be Ozpin?"

He nodded, "Indeed I am, though I'm afraid I do not know your names."

Nodding, the girl stepped forwards and offered a hand, Ozpin shook it, giving a small smile as she introduced herself, it seemed like she was the leader of the four.

"I'm Annabeth Chase. This," she said, gesturing to the first boy, the tall one with green eyes, "Is Percy Jackson." The boy nodded, offering a grin. Her hands moved to point out the other girl, "Thalia Grace, though she prefers to just go by Thalia." The blue-eyed girl offered him a nod. "And Nico di Angelo." She pointed to the last boy.

"It's nice to meet you all, I was doubtful of the truth of what my predecessor had told me of this oath, but with all that's been happening of late I saw no harm in at least trying. Though I must admit I'm surprised at how young you all look."

He caught eye rolls from both Thalia and Nico, and surmised that it might have been something they heard often.

Percy, however, shrugged, "Most of our kind don't make it to adulthood, especially the more powerful they are. We've gotten lucky."

Ozpin raised an eyebrow at the admission, prompting Annabeth to explain.

"What he means is, there are monsters in our world, some similar to what you call Grimm, but many that are far more powerful, smarter, some even capable of higher thought and reasoning. They hunt our kind, they can track us by our scents. The more powerful you are, the more you smell, and the more monsters you will attract. Most of us start training at twelve, some younger, to survive. It's rather complicated, I'm sure we will have time to explain much of it later. I'm guessing so far that you don't really know anything about where we came from?" At that, Ozpin nodded, hoping he could gain some insight into his new allies.

"Well for starters, the oath that you used to bring us here, was made between someone in your world, and some of the Gods of ours." The other girl, Thalia stated dryly.

Ozpin's eyebrows raised, more in question than surprise. He had often wondered about what must have been on the other end of such an agreement, an immortal being was one of the possibilities he often came back to.

"Some of the gods?" he asked, picking out that part of her admission.

"We've found out over the years that the gods of many different ancient pantheons in our history are real. The gods that your pact was made with originated in a place called Greece. They were the religious belief of the people there thousands of years ago, but none now still believe in them, save for the mythical beings associated with them, who know about their existence, and us."

There it was again, 'our kind', 'us'. "And who exactly is us, might I ask?"

"Well, we are the Gods greatest heroes." Percy said, spreading his arms out grandly, "Their children."

Ozpin would never admit to anyone that his jaw had dropped at the statement. In his own defense, it wasn't every day someone came through a magical portal and told you they were the offspring of an immortal deity. Before he could gather himself to ask what he really wanted to ask, Annabeth saved him the trouble, placing a hand on his shoulder and glaring at Percy.

"Ignore him, and no, we aren't Gods. We're just Demigods. One of our parents was an Immortal, and one was a regular human."

Percy smiled sheepishly, "Sorry, kinda used to making jokes like that to people who know about demigods already."

He was offered a kind smile by Ozpin, who had regained his composure, "Not to worry young man." He said, before pausing, "Speaking of which, how old are you all, exactly?"

Percy pointed a thumb at himself, "I'm twenty, been training since I was twelve. I'm pretty good now if I do say so myself."

Thalia seemed to roll her eyes, shoving the tall boy aside. "I'm Thalia, I'm a complicated story, but by the looks of it Artemis let me look my physical age here, so I'm, what, twenty-two or twenty-three?" the other three all shrugged at her, and I looked back to Thalia in confusion. She waved me off, "Don't ask, that'll take time to explain so we can do it later if you really want to know."

Annabeth smirked, "I'm also twenty, like Percy. I've been training since I was seven though, so obviously I'm better than him." Percy, standing behind her, had mockingly mouthed almost every word without pause, and Ozpin's lips twitched into a smile. He broke into laughter when Annabeth, obviously aware of the green-eyed boys' antics, threw an elbow back into his gut. The boy wheezed, falling onto the ground. He offered Thalia a dramatic thumbs up and "worth it" When she leaned over him.

Ozpin turned to look at the final member of their group, who just shrugged, "I'm seventeen. I've been training since I was ten."

Thalia looked up, "Oh right, I've been training since I was like, nine I think? But there was a lot of down time in there so I probably haven't trained any longer than Percy or maybe Annabeth."

Nodding, Ozpin looked over the four, "So, how much do you know about me and my world, now that you've given me a little bit to know about you and yours?"

Percy grinned, "The gods gave us enough information to pass ourselves off as natives here, so we know most of what we need to about your world, auras, Grimm, huntsmen, kingdoms, all that basic stuff." He pointed over at Ozpin, "You though, we don't really know much about. We didn't really get information on people, I think the gods just know what the world is like, they don't keep tabs on this place."

He cleared his throat, "Well, I am Professor Ozpin. I'm the Headmaster of Beacon Academy, in the kingdom of Vale. I'm sure that your information includes knowledge of the school and its purpose?"

Annabeth nodded her head, "Training Huntsmen and Huntresses. It's one of the four big academies, and trains students starting at age 17 after they've left primary hunter schools, like Signal or Sanctum."

Ozpin heard the shorter boy, Nico, scoff, "Figures Annabeth already knows enough about this place to write a book." Thalia and Percy both snickered, while Annabeth just threw a glare at the boy.

"Well, perhaps we should take this conversation elsewhere. I have my own office after all, and it has seats for all of us that I'm sure we could use for the discussion to come."

The four all seemed agreeable, and they followed him out of the chambers to the elevator.

* * *

"Damn," Percy muttered, looking out at the grounds of the school, "This place is huge."

Nico nodded beside him, as the four demigods stood around Ozpin's office, which was at the top of the tower that they had apparently been in one of the basements of. The two boys were staring out the large windows together, while Thalia was relaxing in one of the seats at the desk.

Annabeth was, of course, glued to another part of the window, gushing over the architecture. Percy had grabbed Nico and pulled him as far away from his girlfriend as they could get as soon as he'd seen the view, knowing that there was an imminent explosion coming, filled to the brim with words he couldn't understand being thrown at him a million miles a minute as Annabeth tended to do when she got excited about something. Sometimes it was cute, but when it came to Architecture she tended to go a little bit crazy.

The elevator doors opened, and Ozpin stepped in. He'd brought them up and then left to grab them some drinks. They'd all turned down the offer of coffee, explaining that they really didn't need caffeine. It seemed that ADHD existed in Remnant too, so they didn't have to explain that. Instead, he had brought them their choice of sodas from the options he'd given and described, as none had sounded familiar to any of them. Percy had gone with People Like Grapes soda, because at least he knew it would be grape soda.

"Ah, I see someone has a taste for architecture?" he asked, smiling at Annabeth. If Percy was being honest, so far, Ozpin sort of reminded him of Chiron. He was the authority figure in a place training teenagers to be warriors, and he had that kindly old wise man thing going on, with a sense of humor.

Obviously he must have a more serious side to him, just as Chiron did, but for now, Percy appreciated the feeling of familiarity.

"Please don't encourage her." Thalia muttered, rubbing her temples. Percy chuckled at his cousin, taking a seat beside her. Nico went for the seat on her other side, leaving the one to his left for Annabeth.

Annabeth had turned, seemingly about to burst with questions about the school's design, but she took in the three other demigods sitting and waiting and remembered where they were.

"Uh, right sorry, just um, it's so beautiful I couldn't not look at it." She said, flushing and walking over to take the seat next to Percy. He grinned, patting her knee as she sat down, for which she offered back a small smile.

Ozpin walked over and took his own seat behind the desk, holding a coffee cup in his hands. "Not to worry, its always nice to be passionate about something. Most of the students here are so focussed on becoming hunters that they forget to enjoy the rest of what life has to offer."

He placed his mug down on the desk, "Unfortunately, I did send out that call for aid for a reason, and it will likely result in conflict, which the four of you seem to have signed up for." He paused, looking over the four of them. Percy shrugged. He wasn't really worried about having to fight, it was expected. Besides, if the Gods hadn't been lying in saying it wouldn't be anywhere near the level of the great prophecies in difficulty, what was the worst that could happen?

"So with that in mind, I hope you don't mind if I ask what kind of combat training you all have?"

Percy looked at Annabeth, and then down at his cousins, before he shrugged. "I've been training with a sword since I was twelve, and apparently I'm the best swordsman in over three hundred years, at least among demigods. I can fight with a shield added in as well, and I've trained with spears and axes and knives to different extents. I can't use a bow and arrow at all, trying hasn't gone well for me in the past."

Annabeth spoke up beside him, "There's also our powers to consider."

Ozpin raised an eyebrow, "Powers?"

"Oh, right." Percy said, "Uh, they're kinda like a semblance, except more powerful, and we can have more than one type of power. We inherit them from our godly parent, depending on what they're the god of."

This seemed to interest the Headmaster a great deal, he leaned forwards, elbows resting on his desk, "So, what powers do you have, then, Mr. Jackson?"

Percy gave him a sideways smile, wondering if he was about to blow the headmasters mind.

"I have extensive hydrokinetic abilities, from manipulating water, forming it into a solid form, using it to heal small wounds. I can also breathe underwater, manipulate other liquids to different degrees, even some that don't have any water in them at all. I can even create water from the moisture in the air with enough effort, though it's a lot harder. Aside from that I can create small hurricanes, including clouds, rain, high winds and sometimes thunder and lightning. I can also create small earthquakes, and probably also tsunamis. I've never had any reason to try."

The four of them all chuckled at Ozpin's surprised expression. "If it helps, I'm a bit different than all the others. I ended up with more abilities than most demigods. No idea why, I've never asked."

Ozpin cracked an incredulous looking smile at that, "Well, I guess we can move on to your companions then?"

Thalia took her turn, "I've got extensive training using spear and shield, and I'm also a sure shot with a bow and trained with a variety of knives, mainly throwing knives and hunting knives. Assuming blessings from our gods still work on us here, I'll be even more skilled with the bow than normal. As for powers, I can call upon lightning at will, and manipulate the winds to a lesser amount. Electricity powers me up instead of hurting me, at least to a point, same as how contact with water makes Percy stronger and faster. Getting electrocuted won't heal me though, unlike him."

Now, Nico spoke, "I'm good with a sword, enough to keep up with Percy for a bit in spars. I can cause earthquakes and manipulate the earth to a small degree, more than Percy but not by too much. I can use shadows in order to essentially teleport. There's no real limit to distance, though its easier to go somewhere I've been before or at least have a very good mental image of. Doing it too much and too often is dangerous for me, though if I only make tiny jumps, like a few feet at a time, it has far less affect than travelling from one continent to another. I'm also able to summon undead to fight for me, and control them, though I'm not sure how that will work here, as I normally call upon warriors that fought on or came from the place I'm at, it makes it easier when they have a connection to the place we're at, but I don't know a lot about the military histories here, or what an undead huntsman would be like in terms of power."

The Headmaster looked somewhat uneasy about the notion of the dead rising, but Percy figured that was understandable. He remembered the first time he'd seen it in action, and he hadn't looked any better.

Finally, Annabeth spoke up, "I'm highly trained in most types of weapon combat, as well as multiple forms of unarmed fighting. I specialize in knife fighting, with a sword or spear being my second strongest suit. In a straight fight with no powers I can beat Percy, Thalia or Nico as often or more than any of them beat me. My powers are a lot less flashy than them though. I inherited my intelligence, natural weapon skills and ability to strategize from my godly parent."

Percy chuckled, "She's underselling a bit, she's a genius and deadly." Annabeth rolled her eyes, but smiled at the compliments.

"Well," the Headmaster said, a small smile now on his face. "I'm glad to hear you're all trained, but please don't take it the wrong way that I would appreciate seeing these skills in action to see how you measure compared to Huntsmen and Huntresses. I'd like to take you all out into the Emerald forest, where you can test yourselves against the Grimm firsthand and get a bit of a feel for it. Are you up for it?"

"Heck, why not? First time I've actually been excited to kill monsters." Percy joked, getting up from his seat.

"Percy, maybe we should get our Auras unlocked like we were told before we go running into a Grimm infested forest?" Annabeth chided dryly, gaining snickers from both Thalia and Nico at his expense.

"You don't have aura?" Ozpin questioned.

"No, there's no such thing as aura or semblances in our world. Demigods are tougher and heal faster than normal humans, and we have magical healing food and drink, that's how we survive battle." Nico commented.

The Headmaster seemed to think for a few seconds, staring behind them. "Well, I can certainly unlock all your auras, and then I suppose this will be a chance for you to get accustomed to using them as well. You'll probably feel stronger and faster than normal, the more you learn to control it."

"We've got plenty of practice in learning to control powers, so this shouldn't be too much." Thalia chuckled. Annabeth added in, "I imagine aura is at least somewhat intuitive to learn use of anyways?" She got a nod from Ozpin.

"Well then, lets get your auras unlocked and be on our way, who's first?"

* * *

"Stop twitching." Annabeth muttered lowly, glancing over at her boyfriend.

He pouted at her, holding onto a handrail above their heads in the bullhead. "Come on Annabeth, I feel so different with aura, and we already have ADHD."

"Is this what it felt like with the Achilles curse?" she asked, curious.

Percy shrugged, "Eh, not really? That made me sleepy a lot more often, this just makes me feel awake. Besides, the curse made it hard to tell whether everything missed me or it just didn't do anything, aura is apparently just to dull the pain and prevent cuts and stuff."

She nodded, knowing this, but her curiosity was peaked. They'd never talked too much about how the curse had felt to Percy. "You couldn't tell if you were being hit with the curse?"

His head shook, "Not unless I saw it hit me. When I first got it, I wiped out an undead army Hades brought after me. I didn't feel a thing but my shirt was torn to bits from bullets and swords when the fight was over." Annabeth snorted.

"What?" he asked, defensive already.

"If you hadn't had the curse you'd have been in big trouble, idiot." He smiled sheepishly, saying nothing in reply.

"Alright, here we are!" The Headmaster shouted over the noise of the engines as the bullhead set down in a clearing.

Ozpin stepped out in front, followed by Annabeth and the others. She started looking around for threats as soon as her feet hit the ground. Once they were all clear, the bullhead lifted off, heading back to the school.

"This should be interesting." Percy said, his tone cheery.

"Indeed." The Headmaster agreed, his head nodding slightly in Percy's direction.

Then, his attention shifted, head turning to the right. All four demigods eyes followed, spotting an Ursa major coming out of the brush, glaring at them and then letting out a loud roar to call its brethren.

"That didn't take long." Annabeth said, her voice drowned out by Thalia shouting "DIBS!" and striking forwards at speeds none of the demigods had seen her move before. Nonetheless they were able to track her as she approached the Ursa major, sidestepped its large paw coming down, slash at its face with her spearhead as she deployed it before driving the spear into the grimm's shoulder joint and using her leverage to rip the arm out of its socket, pole-vaulting onto the back of the grimm and driving the spear down through its head, killing it.

"Well, that was impressive." The Headmaster remarked, smirking.

Thalia jumped down from the evaporating Grimm and grinned over at them, "THIS IS AWESOME!" she shouted. As if drawn by the noise, more Grimm started to enter the clearing, Ursai and Beowolves, and the occasional Borbratusk.

Annabeth glanced over at Percy to see him eyeing the Grimm with a grin on his face. He turned and shouted to Thalia, "Whoever gets fewer kills buys the other a shake!" She grinned ferally, "Coolest kill wins a free meal from the other!"

"Done." Percy whispered, before vanishing from Annabeth's side and reappearing in the midst of the Grimm, slicing an Ursa major almost as big as the one Thalia killed in half in a single upwards strike.

He turned to his next opponents, a trio of Beowolves leaping towards him, but before he could act they were each put down by silver arrows sprouting from their eyes. He turned to see Thalia holding her bow, giving him a mock bow before she turned and sliced the head off another Beowolf with a hunting knife. She then sprinted off after more of the Grimm, firing her arrows as she went.

Percy spotted Annabeth fending off two Ursai and ran over to her. She rolled away from an attack as the bear Grimm brought two fists down to the ground where she had been, and stuck her knife deep into its eye. The beast roared, trying to knock Annabeth over by thrashing and swinging its arm outwards, but she ducked the blow and cut clean across the grimm's throat, dropping it. She turned to face the second, but Percy had already taken care of it, slicing the back of the ursa's knees to send it to the ground and then driving his sword through its head.

"Just like old times, huh?" he asked, grinning.

Annabeth smiled in return, quoting Grover, "I seem to remember we almost died a lot in the old times."

Percy shrugged, "bad habits, what can I say." He turned and cut off the head of an approaching Beowolf. They both watched as Nico shadow travelled around the clearing, appearing behind Grimm and slicing them apart before teleporting away. Thalia was on the far end of the field, and she brought out her big guns, summoning a lightning bolt to her spear before thrusting it forwards, channeling the volts through a whole pack of Beowolves, leaving no survivors.

Suddenly, the sound of cracking trees was heard, and a massive Deathstalker exploded into the clearing, sending splinters and branches flying everywhere. Percy shielded his eyes reflexively, and then stared down the massive Grimm. "That could be interesting." He said, looking over his shoulder. Annabeth caught a glance of it, grunting as she sidestepped a Beowolf and kicked it in the side of the head so hard they heard its neck snap. "I'll pass."

Ozpin watched with interest as the Demigods moved around the field, slaughtering Grimm. They seemed to deal with Beowolves as passively as he would, barely paying them any mind as they cut them down. The Ursai they used some caution, but were all clearly capable of finishing with a single blow. The Borbratusks were a similar story, he thought, as Nico cut all four legs off of one rushing towards him, with one swipe. The Headmaster turned his attention to the newest arrival, a massive Deathstalker that was currently being approached by Percy. As the Demigod closed in, the Deathstalker took notice, and began shuffling his way.

The two met, and Percy slipped past the pincers to deliver a punch right in between the Deathstalkers eyes, he then lashed out, putting cuts into the joints of the pincers before he backed away, deflecting the Deathstalker's stinger with his blade. Percy's head turned, sensing the Ursa that was approaching him from behind, and he grabbed the tail of the deathstalker with one hand and cut the stinger off, quickly picking it up while the Grimm recoiled at the pain, and throwing it as hard as he could, nailing the Ursa in the chest and dropping it, as it began to convulse and disperse from the Deathstalker's poison.

Percy then turned to finish the job, going around the outside and cutting off the left pincer, where he'd weakened the joint, before dashing in and taking off the right pincer when the Grimm tried to retaliate. He stared down the Grimm for a long moment before shoving his sword into its head, putting it out of its misery.

"This is going to be very intriguing." He murmured, pulling out his scroll and calling his Deputy.

"Yes, Ozpin?" Glynda Goodwitch asked, with the sounds of students in the background.

"Glynda, I'm going to see about sending some guests to sit in on your First-Year combat class this afternoon. I think you'll be impressed by them."

"Really? And what makes you think that?" she questioned.

Ozpin replied in a wry voice, "The oldest one is twenty-three and I just watched one tear apart an elder deathstalker with ease."

He could almost imagine her blinking in surprise. "Oh."

"I'll explain the specifics later, for now I just wanted to let you know, and if you could, find them an empty dorm to stay in. There are four of them."

"Of course, is that all?"

"Yes, thank you Glynda."

He returned his attention to the Demigods to find that they'd killed all the Grimm in the area, with Annabeth killing the final one, a Borbratusk, by kicking it onto its side while it was curled up and rolling at her, and then gutting it with her knife.

He got their attention and waved them over, using his scroll to summon their bullhead back to Beacon.


	2. Alternate Take

**AN: Not a new chapter, though that one will also be a sparring match, just that Ozpin is asking the Demigods to keep a lower profile in the actual plot. This was something I wrote to blow off some steam and get all the ideas out of my head, in the fantastic AU where Ozpin tells his new allies to go balls to the wall and let everyone and their mother know he has new friends.**

"Are you sure this is a good idea?" Ms. Goodwitch whispered, glancing at the blonde woman standing next to her.

Annabeth smirked, "Worried?"

"I'd rather not have anyone be seriously hurt in my classroom." She responded.

The younger girl gave her a glance, "Percy won't rough them up too much."

"You're that confident in his abilities? You've not been in this world for long."

That earned a shrug, "We're far better trained than your first years, naturally stronger, faster and more aware, and used to fighting in battles where we don't have a special shield to protect us from harm. Your Headmaster thinks Percy is at least as powerful as an experienced huntsman, he made a comparison to someone called Qrow."

"Well," Glynda said, eyeing the green-eyed demigod on her combat stage as he stood waiting to face off against both team RWBY and team JNPR. At the same time.

Percy, meanwhile, was hiding a smile as he stood across from his opponents.

Normally he wasn't one for boasting when it came to fighting, but man, this was just going to be hilarious to see the reactions!

Besides, he'd literally been asked by the Headmaster to thrash his students and let anyone watching know how strong the people in Ozpin's corner were. Beacon was officially Percy's favourite school ever.

Of all time.

The professor, Ms. Goodwitch, asked if he was ready, so he nodded. She asked the same to the two first year teams across from them, and they all repeated the action, though more than a few of them looked concerned. Probably for him, because they weren't expecting one person to beat all of them, or even be a match for them. Even though it was likely that any highly skilled Hunter in Remnant could take on all of them at once and come out on top, the gap between first years and graduates was apparently very big, according to Ozpin, and the one between graduates and elite huntsmen even bigger.

"Begin." He heard, and he instantly shot into action. He'd picked out the weakest link as the blond-haired guy, who was the only one looking nervous at the idea of this. He looked like Percy had when he first got to camp.

He covered the distance so quickly that his opponents had only taken a few steps, and seeing who he was going towards, the redhead girl, Pyrrha, he remembered, tried to step in his path to keep him away from her partner. Percy went down to one knee, sliding under her outstretched shield and crashing into the girl's legs, sending her tumbling. He quickly regained his footing and reached the boy, who raised his big shield in defense. A stupid move, since it blinded the boy to Percy's movement.

Percy reached out with his free hand and ripped the shield off of the boy's arm, swinging it and slamming it into the face of the girl with the ginormous scythe who was attempting to take him from behind. She went flying backwards at the unexpected contact. He heard a roar from the boy and turned in time to catch the hard downwards swing he'd made with Riptide. He felt a small jolt from the impact, proving the blond wasn't a total weakling, but he had no idea what he was doing, and left himself completely open to a firm kick in the stomach, putting him to his knees wheezing.

Percy ducked a punch from the other blonde he was fighting, and backed away from her advances, dancing around the boy that was still gasping for breath. He felt another attacker moving in and made his move, pushing forwards at the blonde girl, catching her off guard as he shoulder checked her in mid swing, sending her back a few steps, then, as he turned and caught two black blades coming his way, parrying the strikes and retaliating with one of his own, Percy grinned as and idea overtook him when he noticed something attached to one of the blades.

He parried two more strikes and kicked out to fend off the blonde girl, before sidestepping a strike from the smaller blade and bringing the flat of his blade down on her wrist quickly. The amber eyed girl cried out and released her sword, which Percy quickly grabbed and yanked away from her, his hand loosening to let it fly away as he gripped the long ribbon attached to it.

He spun it around, letting the momentum carry the swing and giving the ribbon more distance as it came around. The blade at the end forced the other combatants backwards, and when it finally reached around, Percy gave a little extra force to the swing the bring it around the blonde and the owner of the sword he was using, the ribbon caught on them and swung inwards, the sword coming around and tangling with the rest of the ribbon. Percy made a quick yank to tighten it and pulled the two off their feet in the process, but he had to let go and get a move on as the other fighters converged.

He swung his head back to avoid a massive hammer and deflected a barrage of bullets from Pyrrha's rifle and the guns of the other guy in the group. He made his way towards the blond guy, who was back on his feet, but let out a huff of frustration as he had to make a sudden dive to the side to avoid a rapier. The white-haired girl flying past, accelerated by white glyphs. He had to dodge again, but this time it was the tiny scythe wielder, coming towards him at high speeds seemingly on her own, which must have been her semblance. Percy ducked her scythe and sprinted to the blonde boy, slamming his sword aside quickly and slipping a foot behind the boy, taking his feet out from under him.

The boy started to tumble backwards, but Percy grabbed him by the feet and swung him around, throwing him at the two girls who had nearly hit him as they charged towards him again.

He watched the pair's eyes widen as they saw the blond boy being tossed at them, but they were already moving too quickly to avoid it, and the both of them were clotheslined by the poor boy, who crashed to the floor behind them and didn't get up, the professor announcing him as unconscious.

Percy gave the two girls no time to recover as he came their way. The white-haired girl raised her rapier in a panic when she saw him coming, but the force behind his strike sent her blade back, slamming into the girl and throwing her to the ground. As the other girl brought around her scythe in retaliation, Percy stepped back and waited before stabbing Riptide upwards and hooking it at the end of the staff and the start of the blade, halting all the girl's momentum before he pulled back, forcing her off balance and causing her to stumble his way. He struck out, first catching her in the ribs with his sword and then a fist to the face, knocking her onto her back and throwing her aura into the red, putting her out of the fight.

Knowing the white-haired girl was probably nearly out of aura by now too, Percy turned to finish her off. He was forced to stop and duck a shotgun blast from the side, and then parry a trio of punches from the blonde-haired girl. She tried to switch things up by launching a kick, but Percy caught her leg at his hip and twisted, throwing her off her feet so she face-planted on the ground. He turned his attention away in time to catch the rapier of the white-haired girl on Riptide and push it aside, slamming a fist into the girl's gut and then spinning her around into the path of Pyrrha's spear, forcing the redhead to abort her strike. Percy then shoved the rapier girl at Pyrrha, charging at her from behind the girl. Pyrrha dodged her fellow combatant, and managed to fend off a series of hard strikes from Percy.

Seeing that the others were approaching, and the white-haired girl was still winded and dazed. Percy grabbed Pyrrha's arm when she swung at him, taking her sword on his chest, and pulled her close. He used the momentum and slammed his forehead into hers, causing her to stumble back. He dashed away from the hammer girl and the dark-haired boy and drove an elbow into the jaw of rapier girl before he sliced at her with the flat of his sword, throwing her into the arena barrier and eliminating her.

Turning, Percy took stock of the field.

Three members of team JNPR, with only the blonde-haired kid taken out. Two members of team RWBY, the blonde and black-haired girls. Pyrrha and the blonde-haired girl seemed to be the strongest fighters, but both were dazed right now, so he had a chance to take out the other three. He noticed that laying nearby was the blonde kid's sheath/shield, and he grinned, striking off towards it, to the confusion of the three students coming to attack him.

The two black haired ones reached him first, but he already had the shield activated and used it to deflect their combined blows. He lashed out with a foot at the boy and struck with Riptide at the girl to keep her occupied. Waiting for the third attacker to come. When she did, her teammates made space as her hammer came around, and Percy dove aside from the blow, grabbing the black haired girl's leg to try and throw her into the hit, but all he managed to grab was a clone from her semblance.

The next swing came around, and Percy decided to test the ginger girl's strength, pulling up the shield and bracing himself, he took the hammer blow full on. It drove him back a few feet, his shoes tearing up the floor as they tried to stop the momentum, before Percy pushed back and threw her off balance by her hammer. As soon as the pressure was lifted he slammed the shield into her face.

The girl seemed angered by the attack, and her hammer came around wildly again, but she'd stopped paying attention to her teammates, and wasn't able to check her swing when Percy dove at the boy and uppercut him with his hilt, before dragging the poor kid in between his teammate's hammer and the shield Percy had taken.

The girl's eyes widened in despair as she slammed her hammer into the boy, pancaking him between her weapon and Percy's shield, she pulled away immediately, full attention on the boy as she called out his name, hearing the alarm signal that he was eliminated.

That was the last thing she did, as Percy stepped into her and bashed her in the chin with the top of the shield before slamming his pommel into her ribcage, draining the rest of her aura and sending her crashing.

He wasn't given any rest as the blonde-haired girl rocketed towards him and lashed out with a punch, he caught it against his sword, but was thrown off his feet as the blow was far more powerful than any the girl had given before.

He quickly got to his feet, and noticed that her hair was glowing and her eyes were red. She dashed at him again, but he had to turn from her as the other two surviving attackers, Pyrrha and the black-haired girl, engaged him together, their swords swiping in cohesion. Percy quickly found the switch for the shield and reverted it to sheath form, gripping the end of it and using it as a second blade. He parried off the two girls' attacks simultaneously, returning blows any time her caught the smallest hole in their defense to land small jabs at them and wear them down. He felt intense heat approaching from behind and ducked as the blonde girl's fist rocketed overhead, and took advantage of his new position by striking both sword wielders in the knees with his blades and quickly throwing himself to full height again to put his shoulder into the blonde girl's hip as she went overhead, throwing her landing off and making her crash to the ground behind the other two.

He stepped between the two girls, striking at both in a whirlwind and forcing them on the defensive despite outnumbering him. They managed to regroup, but Percy cut towards the black-haired girl with both blades after parrying her blows, forcing her to use her semblance. He felt her leaping over him as her clone took the heavy strike, and quickly spun, catching Pyrrha's attack with Riptide as he shifted the sheath into its shield mode and threw it at black haired girl as she landed. The shield struck her right below the ribcage and took her off her feet, and another alarm went off as her aura dropped into the red.

Percy then kicked Pyrrha in the stomach, throwing her back a few feet, before he turned and dove away, rolling to his feet to avoid the explosions from the blonde girls' shotguns.

Looking down, Percy noticed that the blonde boy's sword was at his feet, and he reached down and grabbed it in his free hand. The two remaining opponents stood across from him, one with an angry twist to her face, complimented with the red eyes, the other with green eyes narrowed in concentration.

He twirled around the boy's sword to get a feel for it as they took one another in, and Percy offered the two a grin.

Annabeth watched the fight with a poorly concealed smirk. She could see Ms. Goodwitch turning to her with an impressed expression, "I guess you weren't exaggerating his skill after all, Ms. Chase."

The Demigoddess chuckled, "He's still holding back." The professor raised an eyebrow before looking over the fight with a more critical eye as Percy laid a kick into Pyrrha Nikos's stomach and dove away from the blasts of Yang's gauntlets, and grabbed Arc's sword. "You're right, he's measuring his blows, he was able to send Ms. Schnee airborne with his sword but that kick only staggered Ms. Nikos."

Watching the stare down that had ensued, Annabeth shrugged, "He doesn't want to accidentally hurt any of them, and if he just went all out this fight would have ended a while ago. They wouldn't learn anything from it and as impressive as it would be, it would have been too quick to really showcase any flashy skills that these kids appreciate. Percy's fighting style is about efficiency, not flair."

"And he hasn't used any of his more powerful abilities, I've noticed, just his natural combat skill."

This time, Annabeth had to hold back a snort, "That's partially because he'd have to rip up your plumbing to get water in here. Ozpin gave us a really loose leash here at Beacon, but he did ask us to avoid inconveniencing you with property damage, if we could help it."

She watched the professor's eye twitch ever so slightly, "Is that so." It didn't come out like a question.

Back on stage, Percy broke the standoff, charging forwards with both blades in hand. His opponents shot into action not a second later.

As the distance closed, Percy went into a spin, he used Riptide to knock Yang's gauntlet off course, before his momentum came around, allowing him to push aside Pyrrha's attack with Jaune's sword. He let his movement carry, ploughing an elbow through Pyrrha's head as he hooked a foot under Yang's leg, sending both his opponents to the ground.

Yang was back on her feet in seconds, launching one of her ranged attacks at him. Percy whacked it aside carelessly, the shot nearly catching Pyrrha in the face as she struggled to regain focus, her head jarred from the contact.

From there, Yang closed the distance again, launching a flurry of furious attacks Percy's way, her hair burning with power from her anger and the heavy blows Percy had landed throughout the fight.

Percy ducked away and sidestepped her assaults calmly, landing insignificant jabs on her body whenever she struck at him, getting under her skin.

Finally, Pyrrha returned to the fight, and to Percy's mild surprise, the two managed to coordinate without communication. The two girls weren't teammates, but he knew they were the top two fighters in the class, and figured that they were just feeding off each other naturally, like he could do with Annabeth or Jason.

He ducked a shield bash from Pyrrha, taking a blow to the shoulder from her sword as he parried a three-point combo from Yang. He quickly retaliated, hurling Riptide at Yang with as much force as he could muster, sending her flying away, his sword gone with her. He then turned to Pyrrha, gripping Jaune's sword with both hands, and began hammering down on her defenses, using pure strength to rattle her and wear down her arms. She took two hits on her shield, before he came at her sword side to force her to use it to block the strike.

As he made contact, her knees buckled and she sunk down under the pressure, barely holding him off. He released back for a moment and then swung again, but she rolled aside, shoving the sword away with a hand.

As Percy moved to engage her once again, Pyrrha squeezed her eyes closed and threw her hands out, putting all her concentration on one thing, and Percy felt Jaune's sword rip from his hands, sent careening across the arena.

He stared at his empty hand for a second or two before rushing forwards and tackling Pyrrha to the ground just as she'd regained her footing. The two went rolling before he grabbed her in a headlock and squeezed. He felt her trying to reach her weapons and bent over her, sending a knee rocketing into her side as he bent her forwards. She gasped and fell to all fours as he released her, and he followed up by driving a foot into the side of her ribcage. Pyrrha Nikos's eyes went wide with shock as all her breath left her lungs, before she lost consciousness.

Now he was down to one opponent, and he could hear her screaming towards him, ready to attack. Percy turned in time to see the fist coming at his face, and he leaned back to avoid it, gripping around the outstretched limb and bringing a knee up into her stomach to stop her momentum. She went on the backfoot to give herself a second reprieve, but Percy didn't give her any time, stepping into her guard and paying her back for the blows she'd been throwing his way, he drove his fists into her core, forcing her to go full defensive, trying to create space so she could escape his attacks.

Finally, Percy left himself open on purpose, and watched as Yang took her shot and kicked out, knocking him back a few steps. She took a deep breath before coming at him again, only for her eyes to widen in surprise as Percy pulled Riptide out of his pocket and activated it, driving the flat of the blade that he'd lost earlier into Yang's temple, putting her out cold.

Percy looked around the fighting area. Ruby, Weiss and Nora were sitting outside the barrier, watching with varying expressions of awe. The rest of their teams were strewn across the arena floor, unlucky enough to still be unconscious and unable to escape to the stands.

The rest of the first years looked at him as if he'd just rode into Beacon on the back of a Goliath Grimm.

Ms. Goodwitch looked very impressed, but was doing her best to try and hide it from the students, and Annabeth of course, was just grinning at him, her head tilted to the side and arms crossed.

Putting away Riptide, Percy took one last look around at the knocked-out teenagers all around him, shrugged, and hopped off the stage. "Any good burger places around here? I'm starving."


	3. Chapter 2

**AN: So here is the actual Chapter 2, featuring the actual spar taking place in the story, where they hold back instead of going balls to the wall on a bunch of unsuspecting teenagers with no chance in hell of beating them.**

"So, we're going to pose as students?" Thalia asked, almost looking sick at the idea. Percy agreed internally.

"Not quite," Ozpin said, leading them through Beacon's courtyard. "You'll be posing as hunters in training from outside the Kingdoms, whom I've brought here to show what life is like at Beacon Academy, and to give you a chance to measure yourselves against students your age."

He turned to look at them over his shoulder, "You won't have to do any classwork, but you are allowed to sit in on first year classes and participate if you want to." He smiled, "A word of advice though, tone down your combat abilities significantly, I've only seen you in action once and you're already far more advanced warriors than most Hunters. If you went full force I fear you'd destroy most of my student body."

"So just water things down?" Percy asked, grinning. Nico groaned, and Annabeth punched him in the arm, rolling her eyes.

Ozpin's eyes twinkled mischievously, "I think you'll all get along well with our students."

Annabeth grumbled, "Only because Percy acts like a five-year-old." Her boyfriend gasped in offense, "Do not!" he pouted, making the blonde look up to the sky in exasperation.

"If we're going to pretend to be trainees, we should probably say we're younger than we are." Nico said, "Well, you guys should, at least."

Percy just shrugged, "We can all pass for 18. Even grandma Thalia over there." The daughter of Zeus glared, "What did you say to me kelp head?"

He leaned over to Annabeth and mock whispered, "Her hearing is going already?" Annabeth snickered, while Thalia leapt onto Percy's back with a roar of anger and started to pummel down on him, he was too busy laughing to care.

Meanwhile, Ozpin spotted one of his students, "Ah, Ms. Rose!" she startled at hearing her name called, but his youngest student recovered quickly and walked over to him, glancing curiously at the mayhem behind him that was his four new allies. When they noticed he'd called someone over, Annabeth moved over and managed to separate Percy and Thalia, holding back her laughter.

"Yes Professor?" Ruby Rose asked, shifting her attention to the Headmaster. He gave her a small smile, gesturing at the four behind him, "Yes, this," he pointed at each of the Demigods in turn, "Is Annabeth, Percy, Thalia and Nico. They're guests of mine that have just arrived at Beacon." The leader of team RWBY turned and waved at them all, saying hi. The four all returned various greetings, secretly sizing up the girl in front of them.

"I was about to ask them if they wished to sit in on a combat class, I believe you're about to go to yours?" the cape wearer nodded, "Ah, good, would you mind taking them there with you? I'm afraid they haven't had a chance to learn the grounds yet."

"Sure!" she piped, smiling. Thalia took the moment to interject.

"Actually, Nico and I were hoping we could go check out Vale, if that's alright?" Ozpin nodded, "Of course, you can come help me move your luggage then, and I'll give you some things you'll need to go into the city. Percy, Annabeth, are you interested in the combat class?" Percy nodded, while Annabeth said, "Yes, Professor, we'd like to see what everyone here is like."

"Alright, follow Ruby here then, she'll take you there. Thalia, Nico, we best be going."

With that, the Headmaster walked off, Thalia and Nico in tow.

"Alllright," Ruby said, waving an arm, "This way."

Annabeth was the first to talk.

"So, you're a student here?" she prodded conversationally. Ruby nodded, grinning. "Yep, Ruby Rose, leader of Team RWBY!"

"Leader huh?" Percy said, "You must be pretty good then."

Ruby shrugs bashfully, "Yea well, I'm pretty good, I guess." She said, "Everyone here is really good at fighting though."

Annabeth offered the girl a grin, "Yet you're a leader and not them." She claimed, "You don't need to be the best fighter to be the best leader."

"It doesn't hurt." Percy joked, a sideways grin on his face, making Ruby laugh.

"So what about your team?"

Percy and Annabeth exchanged a glance, "We aren't really an official team, like you have here." Annabeth explained, "We grew up outside the Kingdoms, Ozpin invited us here to see what life is like at a Huntsman Academy and test our skills against other huntsmen and huntresses around our age."

"Do you guys have a leader then?"

"Percy" Annabeth said, at the same time Percy said "Annabeth."

The two looked at each other, and Ruby laughed again, "Guess not." She decided.

Annabeth sighed, "It's complicated, all four of us are good leaders, just in different ways, so we never really decided on a leader. Usually Percy is the one in charge, but I'm the one who makes the plans."

"What about the other two? Thalia and Nico?"

Percy responded this time, "Thalia's good at being no nonsense, keep everyone on track and make sure everyone does what they're told. Nico's good at improvising."

Ruby smiled a little, as if reminded of something, "Thalia sounds a bit like my partner, Weiss, except Weiss is… Weiss."

"I'm not sure if I should know what that means." Percy said, chuckling.

Ruby looked over her shoulder at him, "You'll get it once you meet her."

"RUBY!"

The girl turned her head again, spotting her sister Yang standing outside the doorway of their combat class, waving at her.

She looked back to Percy and Annabeth, who were looking at Yang curiously, "Come on, that's my sister, Yang, she's on my team." With that, she ran over to her sibling, leaving Percy and Annabeth to follow.

"Where have you been, Rubes?" Yang asked when her sister reached her, "And who are they?"

"This is Percy and Annabeth, they're visiting Beacon and Professor Ozpin asked me to bring them to our combat class."

Yang raised an eyebrow at them curiously, "Are you guys like, transfer students or something?"

The two exchanged a look, "Something like that." Annabeth said, "So, class?"

Percy groaned, "Why do they have to put the word class at the end, class is evil, sparring isn't supposed to be a class!"

"Look on the bright side, Seaweed Brain, maybe they'll let us fight too."

"Oooh, are you guys good?" Yang asked, as the four walked into the room, Ruby taking the lead.

Percy chuckled, "We're alright."

"Well maybe you can fight me. I'll try not to go too hard on you." Yang smirked. Percy said nothing, just grinning in response.

A taller blonde woman walked over to them, dismissing Yang and Ruby to their seats.

"You must be Ozpin's guests?" the woman asked, turning her attention to Percy and Annabeth. "I was told there were four of you?"

Annabeth nodded, "Thalia and Nico wanted to go into Vale. We decided to come here when Ozpin offered." She informed the woman, "I'm Annabeth Chase, this is Percy Jackson."

The woman nodded, "I'm Professor Goodwitch, the instructor of this class, and Deputy Headmistress. From what little I've been told you're quite strong, I hope it goes without saying that if you wish to participate in any spars you'll have to hold back?"

Percy nodded, "Yep, Ozpin wants us to blend in as students, so we don't plan on standing out as fighters."

The Professor nodded, "Good, that being said, I look forward to seeing your true skill in action at some point. Please take a seat, you two." With that, she walked away, towards the front of the room. Percy and Annabeth surveyed the room, before being waved over by Ruby, whose team had two empty spots next to them.

"Okay, so these are our other teammates, Blake and Weiss." Ruby said, pointing at them, "Blake is the one with the book and Weiss is the grumpy looking one."

"I am not grumpy looking!" Weiss objected, seemingly offended.

Percy leaned over to whisper to Ruby, "I see what you meant."

"Right?" the girl exclaimed, arms flying in the air.

Weiss narrowed her eyes, "And what is that supposed to mean?"

He looked at Annabeth, "It's like meeting you all over again." His girlfriend raised an eyebrow in warning, "Really?"

He grinned goofily, "Yep, angry, haughty, already hates me even though she doesn't know me. Ring any bells?"

"Ruby, where did you find this buffoon?"

"Uh, well – "

"See Wise Girl, she's already name calling, this is totally just like meeting you!"

Annabeth ignored him, instead answering Weiss's question, "We were invited here by Professor Ozpin to see what life is like at Beacon for students around our age."

Percy huffed, "Fine, sure, ignore me, your super best friend. I get it."

Ruby 'ooh'ed', "You guys are super best friends? So are me and Weiss!"

"No."

The short girl grinned awkwardly, "We're working on it."

Annabeth covered up a laugh, "We've been best friends since we were twelve."

"Not to mention she's totally in love with me!" Percy said dramatically, making Annabeth roll her eyes, but not deny it.

"Seriously?" Yang asked, looking between the two. Annabeth just shrugged.

"We've been dating for a few years. He's not entirely wrong."

"Yea, see!" Percy exclaimed, "Wait, not entirely? What part am I wrong about?"

"Ahem." The group turned their attention to the front of the class, where Ms. Goodwitch was about to start.

After a short introduction, the Professor got right into the matches, calling up Lie Ren and Blake Belladonna. Percy and Annabeth watched with interest as Blake rose from her seat near them, along with a shorter boy from the team seated on the other side of team RWBY from them. It seemed like the two teams knew each other, as the remainder of team RWBY and the other team offered encouragement to both participants.

"That's Ren. He's part of team JNPR." Ruby supplied, whispering. "We fought in initiation together, and our dorms are across the hall from each other, so they're good friends."

Annabeth took a look down the bench at the rest of team JNPR, "They look nice." She commented, interested in the red-haired girls armour, which seemed Greek in design.

Ruby followed her gaze, and offered an introduction, "That's Pyrrha, she's the best in the class. She's super famous where she came from 'cause she won a bunch of tournaments."

Annabeth nodded, turning her attention to the match that had just started. She was intrigued by the way Blake fought, it was similar to Percy in a way, with the flowing, uninterrupted movement. There were differences, of course. Blake dodged far more often than she parried, especially as her semblance, which was very interesting to see in action, was perfect for it.

It was the first actual semblance either of them had seen in action, and while they both found it impressive, the two demigods silently agreed that they preferred what they had.

"So," Yang broke the silence on the bench, "Think you're up to par with us?" she challenged, smirking.

A small grin slid across Annabeth's face. Blake and the boy, Ren, were impressive, but far slower than they had been while testing out their Aura's in the forest. They could probably take both of them at once on their own. They had significant Weapon skill as well, but Ren's weapons weren't especially strong on their own, and Blake relied too much on her semblance. The Demigods all had more pure weapon skill, already Annabeth had noted multiple times she could have taken advantage in this spar on either side.

Not to say they were bad, but there was obviously a very different learning curve for Hunters compared to Demigods. These students would be at Beacon until they were in their early twenties, and that was when they were supposed to be ready to face the world and the Grimm.

Demigods had to be ready at 12, or earlier, or they were dead. Luckily, Demigods also were stronger and faster than regular humans, and being given Aura on top of it? Well, comparing war hardened demigods to fresh faced hunter students was probably unfair.

She glanced over to see Percy was probably thinking along the same lines. Probably less detailed than she was, but Percy wasn't an idiot, especially when it came to fighting.

So, with the realization of just how much they were going to need to hold back to pretend to be at the same level as these guys, Annabeth replied with "I think we'll do alright."

They watched a few more matches, examining all the different fighting styles and seeing how much difference there was between the skill levels of the different first years. Ruby and Yang provided names and commentary to them for all the combatants during each match.

"Now," Ms. Goodwitch's emerald eyes scanned her students, "Yang Xiao Long," the blonde-haired girl hopped up from the bench, making her way to the stage with a wide grin. The Professor eyed her two guests thoughtfully, "And perhaps one of our visitors would like a chance to test their skills?" she asked, gaining the full attention of the Demigods.

Percy and Annabeth looked at each other, eyebrows raised. Percy shrugged, and deferred to Annabeth, who smirked and stood. "I'd be happy to, Professor." She said, straightening her armour out and heading to the stage.

Yang seemed very excited to be getting her wish to fight one of them, Annabeth took the steps slowly as she got to the stage, a smirk on her face. The rest of the class watched with interest, most of their gazes focussed intently on Annabeth, since she was obviously the unknown in this situation.

Percy had to fight off a grin at the idea of how they might react if Annabeth were to go full force rather than holding back. Yang seemed very confident in her abilities, and from the way the crowd looked on in anticipation he was willing to bet she was one of the best in their class. Yet he knew that Annabeth would probably be able to bash her around like a new camper if she wanted.

On stage, Annabeth watched with interest as Yang deployed her weapons, two yellow gauntlets, which seemed to also be some sort of gun. In return, she simply unsheathed her knife. No doubt her opponent wouldn't take the threat seriously with such a small weapon, as with so many others Annabeth had fought.

She'd make sure that mistake was quickly realized, holding back or not.

Ms. Goodwitch gave Annabeth a meaningful look before speaking, a subtle reminder to keep her strength in check, before asking if both parties were ready to fight. Yang answered with a big grin and an enthusiastic nod. Annabeth just gave the professor a half smile, brandishing her knife a little higher.

"Alright, begin."

Annabeth ducked immediately, anticipating the other blonde's first attack and slipping under the shotgun fire, she weaved her way in to close the distance before striking with her knife, knocking one of Yang's gauntlets aside to make room for the demigod to land a punch to the midsection with her other hand.

Yang took no time to rest before striking back, swinging and jabbing at Annabeth with a volley of punches, Annabeth parried many of them aside with her knife, turning her body to evade the rest.

When Yang's next punch came, Annabeth sidestepped it and grabbed the outstretched arm with her left hand, bringing her knife down for a heavy strike to the girl's shoulder. Yang cried out before returning the favour, bringing her leg up and delivering a kick into Annabeth's side.

Annabeth released her hold on Yang, falling to the side from the kick and quickly rolling back to her feet, avoiding a follow up shot from her opponent's guns. Once she was back on balance, she dashed forwards, surprising Yang with her speed as she indulged in a little bit of showing off.

Thrusting her knife down, Annabeth lodged it into one of the grooves in Yang's right gauntlet, using the leverage to twist and drag Yang's arm around, ducking underneath it as she spun and stepped behind the younger girl. Yang cried out from the motion, trying to spin with it to avoid having her arm pulled out of socket. Instead of keeping her in a hold by the arm, Annabeth pulled her knife back, sending Yang off balance, and then swept her feet out from under her.

Yang's back hit the ground hard, and she let out a grunt. However, she was forced to roll to the side, as Annabeth wasn't about to give her any room to breathe. The demigod came in hard with a kick to the stomach as Yang pushed up to her feet, sending the younger girl stumbling back a few steps before she regained her balance.

As Annabeth approached her again, Yang brought up both her gauntlets defensively to deflect aside the incoming knife strike. She then stepped into Annabeth's guard and swung in a few tight punches to her opponent's midsection before Annabeth was able to jump out of the way, bringing an arm down towards Yang's forearms that was narrowly avoided.

Yang's arms were forced back up to intercept Annabeth's incoming knife, blocking off an attempt to strike her in the face. She caught a second strike towards her chest before retaliating with a wild punch that was easily avoided.

The Huntress in training followed up with a high kick, which Annabeth tucked and rolled under, coming up a foot or so away from her opponent. She spun around quickly as she reached her feet, gripping her knife by the blade and hurling it at Yang's face. Her arms came up, swiping the blade up into the air as she protected her face with her Gauntlets, but the distraction served its purpose, allowing Annabeth to close the distance and ram an elbow up into Yang's chin as her arms came back down.

The strike was enough to leave Yang dazed, and Annabeth capitalized on this by reaching down and ploughing her shoulder into Yang's gut, wrapping an arm around her and lifting the blonde off her feet before throwing herself backwards and driving Yang headfirst into the ground. Annabeth rolled off her back, pushing off the ground and scrambling over to pin her opponent. Not that it mattered, as the match was called to end by Ms. Goodwitch on account of Yang having been knocked unconscious by the last blow to the head.

Realizing this, Annabeth relaxed, taking her forearm away from Yang's throat and leaning back some, hovering over her chest. She watched as the girl's eyes fluttered before opening, and Yang coughed a few times before blinking and looking around, disoriented. Her gaze seemed to finally focus as her eyes looked up to meet Annabeth's, and the demigod offered her a wry smirk.

"So," she asked teasingly, "Think we're up to par with you?"

Yang stared at her in surprise for a moment before she burst into uproarious laughter, making Annabeth grin back.

"You gotta teach me how to do some of those moves, that was awesome!" the brawler responded with after her laughter had settled. Annabeth chuckled, getting to her feet and offering Yang a hand, pulling the younger girl up with her.

Yang turned to face Ms. Goodwitch instead of leaving the stage, so Annabeth followed suit after grabbing her knife, guessing it was part of the class.

"Ms. Xiao Long, your form is good as always, and you kept yourself in check as well, but you didn't make sufficient use of your ranged advantage over your opponent or capitalize on her miscues." The blonde to her side nodded in understanding, her gaze sliding over to Annabeth as Ms. Goodwitch turned her own on the Demigod.

"Ms. Chase, you did very well against a completely unknown opponent, and caught her off guard more than once with your attacks, but you did not make the most of any opportunities you had to end the fight earlier." The older woman lectured, before giving a slight nod, as if to concede the fact she knew Annabeth let those chances go on purpose. Annabeth returned the gesture with a nod similar to Yang's before they were allowed to go back to their seats.

Annabeth could hear Ruby practically freaking out before she'd even got off the stage, and Yang looked back over her shoulder at her with a smirk, "You're in for it now." She joked, nodding in the direction of her sister.

"That was so cool!" the young team leader exclaimed as Annabeth and Yang reached their seats. Percy gave her a playful pat on the head, only earning an annoyed glare in reply before he grinned sheepishly and pulled his hands away in surrender.

"It was rather impressive." Blake remarked casually, glancing up from her book. Yang chuckled at the comment while Weiss scoffed, "I'm most surprised by the complete lack of dust. Doesn't such a choice in weapons feel restricting?"

Annabeth shrugged, "I've been training with a knife since I was seven. I can use other weapons too, but it's my favourite. Besides that, I know how to fight unarmed, and that gives me more than enough variety. I'd say."

"You still don't have any range." Yang countered, raising an eyebrow. Percy laughed when he heard her, before covering up by coughing into his fist.

The blonde Huntress looked over to him questioningly, as did the rest of her team and Annabeth, and the boy laughed again before answering the unspoken question, "She seemed to have plenty of range when she threw the knife at you, and besides, not everyone needs a ranged weapon to fight. I don't have one, neither does our teammate Nico."

"Seriously? What do you guys use?" Ruby asked.

"Nico and I both have swords. Thalia's the only one on the team who likes to go overkill." He joked, "She's got knives, a spear and shield and a bow and arrows."

"So, what if you need to kill something far away, chuck your sword and hope for the best?" Yang asked in a teasing tone. Annabeth hid her smile at the question, while Percy just grinned lopsidedly at the four girls, "Let's just say that we make up for the lack of range with mine, Thalia and Nico's semblances." He told them, leaving the rest to their imaginations.

"Oh, so you're one of those people who likes to keep their semblance a secret?" Weiss asked, her eyes trailing away for a moment, not unnoticed by either Demigod, to the redhead, Pyrrha.

Percy nodded, "I like to keep it up my sleeve for when I'm in trouble. If I can get by without it, all the better."

"Guess we'll just have to force your hand at some point, then." Yang challenged with a wicked grin, which Percy returned in full after a glance to Annabeth.

"I'd like to see you try."

Yea, Percy thought, smugly, that wasn't going to happen.

* * *

"That is quite fascinating." Ozpin remarked, looking down at his two charges. "I've seen a great many things, and I myself have a great deal of experience in matters of time, but your stories aren't like anything I've heard before."

"You have experience with this sort of thing? I was a tree for like five years." Thalia deadpanned.

"And I'm technically eighty years old because I was put in a magical building where time passes differently, but my body and mind are only seventeen." Nico added, equally monotone.

Ozpin smiled at them enigmatically, "Suffice to say, I'm much older than eighty. Let's just say that this is not my first time around the block, so to speak, and leave it at that. Such conversations are best kept for behind closed doors."

Reminded of the secrecy that must be maintained regarding their quest, the two demigods nodded seriously.

"So, what's the things we'll need for going into Vale?" Thalia asked, now that they'd finished putting their bags away. It was a good thing that all the demigods were used to sleeping in close quarters during quests and hunts, because they'd been supplied with a standard guest room for Hunter teams of four, which didn't exactly lend themselves to privacy.

Nico had taken one look at it, shrugged, and said that it was better than the underworld. Thalia chuckled to herself as she remembered the surprised look on Ozpin's face when he overheard the comment. It was going to be a hilarious time telling him just how much actual combat experience they had, and what their world was really like.

He'd been worried about the fact they were so young, not knowing that he had what essentially amounted to the most experienced, war hardened, lethal and dangerous demigods that Olympus could put on a single team.

Especially if what her father had said about almost any trained demigods being capable of succeeding on this quest… she got the feeling that the scales were tipped heavily towards their world in terms of strength. Then again, they hadn't gotten the full rundown from Ozpin yet, either, and the fact he had just hinted at having an unnaturally long lifespan, along with the fact he was the one who brought them here, suggested that there was a little more than meets the eye going on in Remnant.

Thalia couldn't wait to curb stomp those things.

She was brought back from her thoughts as she heard Ozpin answering her question.

"Well," he began, "You'll need to be able to communicate, and access information here in remnant, so we'll have to get you all scrolls." He told her. "We have school scrolls pre-ordered before semesters start for new students, but your arrivals wasn't something I could predict anything on, and to be honest, I sent out the call almost on a whim. I've had documents printed out that you can take to our supplier shop in Vale to get your own, so that you can gather your scrolls from them today, and the payment will be charged to the school."

The two nodded in understanding as Ozpin handed Thalia the mentioned papers. "As well, I'll be supplying you with a little bit of pocket money, as I somehow doubt you have any Lien of your own. I will be able to set up bank accounts later, which will be supplied with the typical student allowance each month. Any other expenses regarding your purpose here can come out of the school budget or my own accounts, though I'm not sure you will need much in that regard. Especially as a part of the student allowance is meant for ammunition replenishments, and none of you will have any need of that unless you decide to explore with dust of your own accord."

With that, he handed each of them a small wallet. "I believe I'll keep the other two for now, and deliver them to your teammates myself, otherwise I fear they'll find out they bought you an expensive dinner tonight."

Thalia chuckled a little at the accusation, shrugging, "Can't say you're wrong, at least for Percy's."

Nico frowned at her, "I was gonna spend Percy's."

Ozpin smiled, "Not Annabeth's?" Thalia snorted and shook her head, while Nico looked Ozpin in the eye.

"I prefer living, thanks." He said, making Thalia mumble an amused "Contrary to popular belief." Under her breath.

"Oh, here I thought that Mr. Jackson was the stronger of the two?" Thalia grinned.

"He is, but he's too nice to actually do something when its just about money like this. Annabeth though, she doesn't take crap from anybody." She explained, "Don't get me wrong, Percy can be terrifying, but usually that only happens if someone he cares about is in danger."

Thalia sighed, "I don't think you'll really understand until you've seen him go all out, or at least until we have time to give you a rundown of our history." She said, "Watching him fight in the Battle of Manhattan, facing off against Hyperion, he looked like one of the gods."

Ozpin looked intrigued, "If I man ask, who is Hyperion?"

Nico answered for her, "The third strongest of the Titan Lords, behind Kronos and Atlas. He's the Titan of Light, Fire and Power. Percy fought him over the lake in Central Park, dousing the fires on his body with a hurricane."

"And these Titan lords are powerful?"

Thalia nodded, "They're immortal deities, they ruled before the gods, Kronos is the father of mine, Nico and Percy's dads. Before them were the Primordials."

"Hmm." Was all the headmaster said to this, honestly, Thalia was glad for that. Annabeth would be much better with all this explaining stuff, Thalia herself wasn't exactly one for words.

"Well, I shall not keep you here any longer, you two have a city to explore after all." Ozpin said after a long pause, "I trust you remember my directions to the docks?" they nodded, "Good, if you need me for anything, once you have your scrolls my office number should be in the contacts, as well as the general school line. When you've returned, and classes are done with, I'll introduce you all formally to my second, Ms. Goodwitch, as well as another confidant in all of this, if he is able to arrive in time."

With that, the old headmaster walked off, whistling some tune the two didn't recognize.

"Gods," Nico said, watching after him, "It's a wonder nobody's figured out he's keeping secrets. He's even more enigmatic than Chiron tries to be."

Thalia laughed, shaking her head, "My bet is he's got it all played down to the kindly old headmaster thing. I mean, probably the only people he regularly interacts with are either students, teachers, or probably people who are in his circle."

The two headed towards the docks to catch a ride to Vale, unaware of the Crow watching their departure. The bird continued to watch from its perch until they were out of sight before taking off in the direction of the Headmaster, soaring over Beacon and wondering what those two kids had to do with his being called back here by Ozpin.


End file.
